Dan Wang is a technology analyst at Gavekal Dragonomics, a macro research firm, where he focuses on Chinese technology and industrial policy, global supply chains, and U.S. regulatory actions. Wang studied philosophy at the University of Rochester and previously worked in Silicon Valley. He is based in Shanghai and is also a contributor to Bloomberg Opinion. He writes about technology, history and literature on his personal site, danwang.co. He was recently a guest on the Sinica podcast. What follows is a lightly edited interview.
Dan Wang.Illustration by Kate Copeland
Q: The last year of the Trump administration saw a U.S. campaign against China’s semiconductor industry — both semiconductor makers like SMIC and HiSilicon as well as end users. What is the state of China’s semiconductor industry today?
A: China has figured out the basics of most parts of semiconductor technologies, but it is not leading in any of them. So, in the most generous cut, Chinese manufacturing i